


Staying Bound

by flashforeward



Category: Murdoch Mysteries
Genre: Dom/sub, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-15
Updated: 2016-02-15
Packaged: 2018-05-20 15:08:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6013342
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flashforeward/pseuds/flashforeward
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Brackenreid keeps tying him up, Harry keeps escaping.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Staying Bound

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this for a friend after watching the Houdini episode and well. When it turned out sweeter than I expected I decided to share it.

"It's all well and good, being able to escape, Harold," Thomas whispers, his lips tantalizingly close to Harry's ear. His careful fingers tie careful knots in the coarse ropes that hold Harry's wrists against the bed posts. The chafe is nice, different from the cold of irons. He gives a half hearted struggle and moans when Thomas digs hard fingernails into the skin of his forearms in response.

 

"The real question, my boy," Thomas continues when he's satisfied Harry will stay still, "is do you trust me enough to stay bound?" He pulls back, holding himself over Harry on strong, steady hands. Harry whimpers, tries to arch up, to catch the half-smile on Thomas's lips in a kiss, but the ropes hold him down and Thomas shakes his head and sits back on his heels, running a lazy hand down his bare chest to the tent in his trousers. "Any of that, and there's none of this," he says, stroking his palm down, biting his lip against a moan.

 

"Sadist," Harry spits, but there's no venom in it and he's smiling as he says it. "How long do I have to stay prisoner before you'll touch me?" he asks. They've been over this already, but talking is a distraction.

 

Thomas considers him, his hand moving slowly over his crotch. "Not too long," he says in a hoarse voice. He clears his throat and starts again. "Not too long, Harold. Just. Long enough." He doesn't finish. Doesn't need to. Long enough to make sure Harry will stay put, long enough for Harry _not_ to escape.

 

Reluctantly, Thomas slips off the bed and walks towards the door. "I'm in shouting distance," he says, his voice hoarse again. "If you need me."

 

This is the true test. Here, now, with no one to see. Harry could easily slip the knots and be sprawled naked and ready when Thomas comes back, but that isn't the game today.  Today Harry has to stay put, as ordered - as he never has before because he doesn't stay put well. The fun of being tied up, for him, is in the escaping. Not in the being tied up. For Thomas, seeing him prone and vulnerable, unable to control the situation, that's what he wants. What he's wanted every time. What Harry hasn't been able to give him.

 

Can he?

 

He's wondered that since whatever this was started. Since the first time those rough hands gripped his arms, pushing him down on the bed after another escape, Thomas's voice growling in his ear, telling him off for slipping his bonds. And every time after, when Thomas ties him up and tells him to stay put but he doesn't, he has wondered if he can.

 

And this is the test.

 

He tugs a little at the ropes that hold him in place. They're tight and it would be tricky, Thomas is damn good with knots, but he could get out of them before Thomas comes back.  Perhaps if he looks wanton enough he'll get what he wants anyway, he thinks, and absentmindedly starts working his right hand loose.

 

But...

 

No. He knows this time is the last time. If he slips the ropes now he'll never have Thomas again. And somehow, somewhere along the way, he's come to want Thomas as more than just a pleasant diversion. And perhaps. Perhaps it would be nice to give up control for once, to let someone else run the show.

 

H e shakes his head.

 

No. He isn't on stage, this isn't a show. Thomas isn't an audience he's. Well. He's someone Harry's grown to care about, and he doesn't want to lose that. He stills his hands and stares up at the ceiling, pulling in slow deep breaths one at a time, counting down from ten and then holding it. He focuses on his lungs, full of air , waits for the familiar burn to start. The need to breath. Fights against it. Keeps holding his breath until.

 

"Damn it, Harold, breathe!" Thomas is there, looming over him, eyes wide and worried. Harry shakes his head. Thomas grabs his shoulders, holding his gaze. "Breathe, Harold, you don't have. You don't have to do this. I didn't mean."

 

Slowly, carefully, Harry lets the breath out. "Sorry," he whispers, trying to turn away but finding himself hindered by ropes and hands. He starts undoing his right arm again, but Thomas slides a hand up and stills his fingers.

 

"Don't apologize," Thomas whispers. "I should have. I should have thought." He presses a kiss to Harry's lips, slow and sweet. "I should have realized you'd try to find something else to control," he says when he pulls away. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have left you alone, not even for a little while."

 

"I'm all right on my own," Harry protests, but he's quickly distracted by the ropes at his wrists loosening and falling away. Then Thomas turns and undoes the ones holding his ankles. "I thought you liked me tied up," Harry whispers, wondering how he's mucked it up this time, what he's done wrong now.

 

Thomas catches his eye and smiles. "I do, my boy," he says, turning and running a hand up Harry's leg, sliding it down around his buttocks and squeezing. "But this is a mite easier when you're free."

 

Harry moans and arches his back, pressing his body flush against Thomas's. Only now, as their cocks touch and Thomas wraps one of those strong, calloused hands around them, does Harry realize Thomas must have taken off his trousers. Not that it's a thought at the forefront of his mind as their lips meet in a hungry, heated kiss, and their bodies slid e against each other.

 

"Harry," Thomas whispers, pulling away and loosening his grip on their cocks, making Harry whimper. "Harry, I'm sorry. I swear I'll never do that to you again."

 

Harry blinks his eyes open, forcing himself to focus on Thomas's gaze. "Thank you," he says. "And. And I promise if you want to tie me up, I won't escape. Unless. Unless you want me to." He wouldn't promise it to anyone else, and probably wouldn't have promised it to Thomas if the other man had called him Harold.

 

But hearing  _Harry_ rolling off that tongue for the first time brought a heady realization to Harry's mind and as Thomas returns to kissing and to touching, as they return to getting lost in each other, Harry just accepts it: he's fallen in love.


End file.
